About Us

ASIA Inspirations is the tailor-made travel service by Wendy Wu Tours. It is based on the
principles of:

Personal, flexible and individual itineraries so you can get the most from your holiday

Expertise throughout Asia so we can help you to design your perfect holiday

Service you can trust as evidenced by our numerous awards and
delighted customers

Wendy Wu Tours is the UK’s leading specialist tour operator to Asia with destinations covering China, Southeast Asia, Northeast Asia and the Indian Subcontinent.

Wendy established her first business in Australia in 1998 and rapidly became the largest tour operator
to China. Other destinations in Asia soon followed. In 2004 Wendy opened an office in London and
quickly became the leading specialist tour operator to
Asia from the UK, winning many awards on
the way.
Wendy Wu Tours has also expanded to the US, opening a business there in 2010. Wendy Wu Tours
has offices in London, Sydney, New York, Shanghai and Xian.

Wendy Wu Tours is fully bonded with ABTA, ATOL and IATA so your holiday with us is 100% financially secure.

Awards

ASIA Inspirations is the tailor-made travel service of Wendy Wu Tours and we are proud to have won numerous awards in 2013. We were awarded Tour Operator of the Year by industry newspaper Travel Trade Gazette beating competition including Virgin Holidays, Kuoni and Thomas Cook. It is the first time that a specialist tour operator has won this prestigious award.

At the British Travel Awards we were recognised as the Best Small Holiday Company to East & Central Asia and also the Best Small Holiday Company to Southeast Asia. We have also been a winner at the Globe Travel Awards, the Travel Bulletin Star Awards and the Travel Agents Choice Awards as well as being commended at the Wanderlust World Guide Awards.

The Wendy Wu Story

The life of Wendy Wu is an intriguing story. Born in Tibet, she now owns and heads a global travel company
that takes travellers from three continents to her native China and across Asia. Because of her intimate
knowledge of the region, she is able to take clients deeper into Asia than others, and she has rapidly moved
to the top of her field.

Wendy first started operating tours from Australia 20 years ago and within a few years she became the
largest specialist operator to China. In 2004 she set up business in London and quickly became the leading
tour operator to Asia from the UK. In 2010 Wendy Wu Tours expanded to the US by opening an office in
New York. Improbable as was her rise to the head of a global travel company, looking back her humble
beginnings were actually the key to her success. Living and travelling in so many parts of China as a child, it
seems only natural that Wendy should have a career in the travel industry.

Wendy travelled almost from birth and experienced many contrasting environments in China while growing
up. Wendy's father was the principal administrator of the Peoples' Hospital in Lhasa but at the time Tibet
was still very undeveloped and not the best place to raise an infant. So Wendy was sent to stay with her
grandparents in Sichuan province, the home of the famous cuisine and the pandas.

She lived in Tibet, Sichuan, Shanghai and Jiangsu Province before attending university in Harbin,
Manchuria. She also took many holidays with her parents. "When I was a child, travel was frequent to
say the least," says Wendy. "My parents were always travelling and I went with them. Ever since I was
born I was travelling all the time. One of my most memorable trips was to cruise down the Yangtze
River from Chongqing through the Three Gorges to Shanghai long before it was on the tourist map.
It was mostly cargo ships in those days."

But it wasn't until she had lived in Australia for a few years and visited much of the country that she
really got the travel bug. "Having seen so much of Australia I decided that I really wanted to go back
and explore again the country of my birth," Wendy confides. "And after a lot of research I put together
an itinerary that included all of the essential sights as well as some of the hidden gems. Through my
knowledge of China I could visit many fascinating places that were unknown to the western world."
Wendy wanted to share her journey with a travelling companion, so she advertised in the local
newspaper.

She was inundated with calls. It showed her that there was a huge demand for travel to
China and the idea of starting a travel company came to life. Wendy approached a travel agency in
Sydney and a partnership was born in which she developed and promoted her own tours through the
agency. This was 1993. Who could have foreseen then what this small start would become?

In 1998 Wendy left the travel agency and started her own company, Wendy Wu Tours. In four short
years, the airlines told her that she was carrying more passengers to China from Australia than any other
tour operator. Based on this success Wendy wanted to grow the company further leading to the
introduction of tours to other destinations in Asia based on the same winning formula. And with the
Australian market conquered, it was only a matter of time before Wendy would move on to the
challenges of the UK market and later the US.

But Wendy never stops working on the next idea to bring the delights of Asian travel to ever more
people."So far in the UK I have concentrated mainly on group tours while I have been establishing the
business," says Wendy. "It has been important to me to ensure that we have got this absolutely
right before moving on to other things."

"Our Australian office has been offering tailor-made tours to Asia for over ten years and it is a core part
of the company. The time is now right for me to share this expertise in the UK."

"Since tailor-made private touring is fundamentally different from group tours I wanted to establish a
separate identity. This is to demonstrate that we are really focusing on the needs of individual
travellers and to show that the itineraries we create can be truly unique and flexible."
And so ASIA Inspirations was born.